The present invention relates to user interfaces and in particular to a user interface having selectable historical and/or default values.
Unless otherwise indicated herein, the approaches described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Computer user interface (UI) users continually fill out UI dialogs, which typically comprise various kinds of data input fields. Such data input fields may be represented by images such as alphanumeric input boxes, checkboxes, radio buttons, dropdown menus, sliders, and so on. A common problem and deterrent to user productivity is having to re-enter the same information that was previously entered in earlier sessions of use. It can be tedious having to re-enter information from previous sessions. The same can be true for implementing default user values or default initial values such as “factory settings” for a specific set of controls of an application's user interface.
Some typical operational scenarios of repetitive activities include: Setting up new jobs or informational forms in an application may require the user to frequently choose values from one or more previous sessions, or user default values, or initial default (e.g., factory settings) values. Maintaining existing jobs or informational forms of an application may require the user to recall seeing and setting specific controls to values that have been chosen in previous sessions. Changing existing jobs or informational forms may require the user to set an entire section of values to user defaults or initial default (factory settings) values, or to values from one or more previous sessions. Changing input values in a current dialog or UI form may require inputting a mixture of values from a variety of previous sessions, user default values, or initial default values.
These and other problems are addressed by embodiments of the invention, individually and collectively.